Category Archives: Andrew Chalk

by Steven Doyle | February 24, 2014 · 9:36 am

After the 100-year Freeze Texas Grape Growers Fight Back

andrew1 by Andrew Chalk

Last year, late frosts in the Texas High Plains devastated the wine grape crop by around 90%. The event was so unusual that the U.S. Weather Service estimated that it was likely to happen less than once in every 100 years. How has the disaster affected grape growers views of the high plains as a grape growing area? Are they picking up sticks and planting other crops? I asked growers attending the Texas Wine and Grape Growers Annual Conference last week in Frisco. Continue reading →

5 Comments

Filed under Andrew Chalk

Tagged as Andy Timmons, GrapesTexas Wine and Grape Growers Annual Conference, Texas, Texas Custom Wine Works, Vineyard

by Steven Doyle | February 17, 2014 · 9:00 am

Travel Report: Galveston, Not Just Fried Fish Dinners Any More

galveston by Andrew Chalk

We can accept that Galveston is a great place to get a fish-fry, run on the beach, visit the impressive Moody Gardens with aquarium and rain forest, or even just board a cruise ship. What may not as well-known is that Galveston is undergoing change that makes it a quite satisfying long weekend destination for the gourmet traveler.

By ‘gourmet’ I mean not just restaurants, but also food purveyors, hotels, breweries, wineries and distillers. Gourmet as a whole lifestyle of fine eating, drinking and travelling. All other versions of these things fit under the description of ‘work’. Recently, the Galveston Island Convention and Visitors Bureau (the organization responsible for galvanizing for Galveston), tiring of their prime catchment market (the rest of Texas) not knowing the truth about them, gathered some media and showed us what the Galveston of today has to offer. As a first-time visitor, I was intrigued but had little idea of what to expect. Continue reading →

3 Comments

Filed under Andrew Chalk

Tagged as Galveston, restaurants, Texas, What to do in Galveston

by Steven Doyle | February 14, 2014 · 10:38 am

Sommeliers: Stories from The Front Line

mr-creosote1 by Andrew Chalk

If you work in the hospitality industry you serve humanity. You are bound to come across all types of people and accumulate some funny anecdotes over the years. I surveyed Dallas sommeliers about the soft underbelly of wine service.

Anthony Martinez at The Gaylord Texan handles thousands of wine orders a week. He still remembers the time that a table asked for straws and drank their wine from a straw. Another time, a guest tasted the wine straight from the bottle. Continue reading →

How Do We Interpret Anheuser Busch’s Proposed Acquisition of Craft Brewer Blue Point Brewing Company?

bluepointbrewery

by Andrew Chalk

On Wednesday 5th February Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB) announced an agreement to acquire Blue Point Brewing Company of New York. The deal values Blue Point at $24m and is expected to conclude in the first quarter of 2014.

Blue Point Brewing Company is a leading craft brewer, producing over 40 beers sold in 15 states, mainly along the U.S. east coast. AB is the world’s largest brewer, with 48% of the U.S. market. Blue Point sold around 60,000 barrels in 2013. AB sold 98.8 million barrels in the U.S. in the same period.

Why would AB want to acquire such a minnow? Continue reading →

1 Comment

Filed under Andrew Chalk

Tagged as beer, Blue Point Brewing Company, Budweiser, New York

by Steven Doyle | February 11, 2014 · 9:34 am

We Are About To Get Insight Into The Character Of Todd Staples

todd by Andrew Chalk

TheTodd Staples, Wine is involved in two important things. First, as you have doubtless seen from his frequent television commercials, he is a candidate for Lieutenant Governor. Second, he is about to deliberate over the future of the Go Texan rule regarding how much of the grapes in a wine marked ‘Go Texan’ must be Texas fruit. The rule he inherited is a travesty — it allows such a wine to contain 0% Texas fruit! Continue reading →

4 Comments

Filed under Andrew Chalk

Tagged as Go Texan, Texas Commissioner for Agriculture, Todd Staples, wine

by Steven Doyle | February 10, 2014 · 9:18 am

An Appellated Gulf Oyster?

IMG_20140204_184159.640x480 A Whitehead Reef Oyster

by Andrew Chalk

Eaten a gulf oyster recently? Where, in the thousands of square miles that constitute the Gulf of Mexico, did it come from? You probably were not told. The person who sold it to you probably did not know. I never considered it mattered before.

It turns out it does. Where in the gulf an oyster grew up affects its size and taste. If we know where oysters come from, we can choose between them based on quality, or size, or flavor profile. If we choose oysters from particular locations then oystermen will know what types to harvest. Continue reading →

4 Comments

Filed under Andrew Chalk

Tagged as Dallas, Galveston, Gulf of Texas, Oysters, Stampede 66, TJ's Seafood Market

by Steven Doyle | February 7, 2014 · 9:16 am

A Corkscrew for the Edge Case

durand2 by Andrew Chalk

Anyone introducing a new corkscrew to the market has the onus on them to explain why it is needed. Fortunately, The Durand, a new corkscrew from Wining Taylors in Atlanta, comes with a complete story built in. Wining Taylors CEO, Mark Taylor, explains “We do want to be sure that everyone understands that The Durand is the only device that will reliably remove, whole, an old and fragile cork from a valued older bottle of wine, but that it is not intended for use with a firm newer cork”. Continue reading →

Galveston Entrepreneur Puts Margaritas In The Bag

Lt. Blender AKA Ralph McMorris

by Andrew Chalk

This is Ralph McMorris, better known as Lt. Blender. He got that name because, when he served in the U.S. Army, he was the only one with a blender during one tour of duty. When it broke, he improvised by making margaritas in a bag. That made him very popular. He parlayed his drink making skills into Lt. Blender’s drink mixes. In case you think that an entrepreneur’s life consists solely of jetting around in private planes like one of the Sharks, ask Mark Cuban what it was like when he started, selling door-to-door. Or Barbara Corcoran what it was like waiting tables in NYC. In a similar vein, below is Lt. Blender’s one and only production facility. It is situated in a Victorian house near the Galveston historic district. Continue reading →